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I'll be honest, I'm usually a glass half-empty type of person. And when it comes to last Tuesday's election, the glass wasn't left half-empty, it was left 99.9% empty. Like last year, Evansville failed to take advantage of the many great candidates who came into the election looking to do what is right for their city instead of their career.
Before I get into the .01% good news we received Tuesday, I want to first discuss and thank those who ran for Evansville and Roberts Stadium but came up short in the election. We owe it to these people to make sure they get the thanks and praise they worked so hard for.
The first candidate who I feel got shafted was Lon Walters. Those of you who read this blog frequently know that I am an enormous supporter of Lon. I don't think there's any question that he lost last year's City Council race to Mosby simply because of the R he had behind his name in an overwhelmingly Democrat area. I have yet to hear anyone from any organization come up to me and tell me they were damn glad they voted for Mosby (are they embarrassed?). But on the flip side, I had to quit counting the amount of people who have told me they wish they lived in the 2nd Ward when Lon was up for election. That speaks for itself.
12 months later, Lon was in the middle of yet another fight that couldn't have gone any lower. His opponent decided to withdraw from the election, was told she couldn't, then decides she's going to campaign again. For Lon to have to battle these type of elections is embarrassing to the city of Evansville. It reminds me a lot of what J.D Strouth has had to battle. Next election cycle, let's get these guys in office.
Also, I want to thank Will Singleton for the battle he ran for the EVSC School Board. What I liked about his campaign the most was that it was grass roots, it was blue collar and hard working, and it was honest. It was nice to see a candidate out there battling on the issues instead of taking marching orders from Mark Owen or Wayne Parke. This was Will's first election, and I'm confident he will be back. So for those who thought they would bury grass roots candidates like Will Singleton, think again!
Lastly, the loss that has given me the most hard burn this week was the Evansville Treasurer's race where Rick Davis came up just a little short of re-election. Many of those who are a part of the local shadow government are hoping that this is Rick's last election. But they aren't considering the following...
1. Rick only lost by roughly 1,000 votes in an election that had 70,000 votes
2. The amount of votes Rick got was more than what he and Lloyd Winnecke got COMBINED last year.
3. Most of those who are fighting Rick behind the scenes will be out of office and/or will have left Evansville by 2015 when the next mayoral election rolls around. Look back to 2007, how many of those candidates are still running for office or are even still in town? Even politicians like leaving Evansville.
If we are going to be successful in dismantling the machine that runs Evansville, we need to get Rick Davis back in government! There are enough supporters of Roberts Stadium alone to make this happen so let's get it done.
Now, with all of that being said, there is ONE single race (the .01%) that we can celebrate, and I plan on doing just that. Early on, I supported the Yes! campaign with the main reason being that I was overwhelmingly satisfied with consolidation when I lived in Lexington, Kentucky. The best thing consolidation did for Lexington was help the city establish an urban growth boundary which has helped keep Lexington's infrastructure expenses in check and their environmental impact to a minimum.
But as I dug deeper into the Yes! campaign., I was convinced more than ever that the powers that be in Evansville weren't interested in true consolidation. Rather, these "advocates" mostly consisted of bad people wanting to do bad things to Evansville such as gain an enormous amount of power for them and their cronies, approve of a plan they didn't believe in but were told to do so, and/or develop a plan that didn't even consist of zoning changes much less an urban growth boundary.
Given that belief, I went to Wesselman Park yesterday and chucked my Yes! sign in the recycling bin. Maybe the people who run Wesselman Woods & Park, who were so hellbent that they needed Roberts Stadium demolished, can find a use for this sign...
Not only was I glad to see the plan that was deemed "consolidation" fail to pass, I was also glad to see the Yes! campaign specifically fail miserably by a 66-34 margin. The main reason I was glad to see this was the fact that here we had a conglomerate of city officials and leaders who basically screwed Roberts Stadium over royally only to get soundly defeated with their own project by city and county residents directly.
What were some of the highlights of the Yes! campaign defeat?
-Roberta Heiman and the League of Women Voters spent over 2 years working on the plan only to lose by a 2-1 voter margin. Not only is Heiman a member of the League of Women Voters, she also leads the Evansville Trails Coalition, an organization that I fully support even though I don't support Heiman leading this organization.
Last year, I went to an ETC meeting to specifically let them know that I wanted to craft a plan that benefited EVERYONE, not just those who supported Roberts Stadium. I talked about the fact that we could build a park in the back lot that would be roughly the size of the green space going up on the old airport lot. I talked about the fact that we could use Roberts Stadium as an indoor greenway trail hub on non-event days just like I have discussed on this blog many times over.
What struck me as odd was the fact that almost all of the members were excited about the prospect of these ideas... EXCEPT Heiman who said "Given we already have the mall we may not need an indoor facility." So if we have sidewalks and park trails do we still need a greenway? And why would anyone want to go walking in a mall where traffic patterns are going in multiple directions when they could go to Roberts which would be for walkers only just like Ben Hill Griffin Stadium is in Gainesville, Florida on non-event days?
As the meeting finished up, Heiman looked at me and said, "One man CAN make a difference." Little did I know, Winnecke would appoint her to the Parks Board where she would approve demolition of Roberts Stadium while saying " I am so excited about this lot." So much for one person making a difference. The actions of Roberta Heiman are solid proof that one man cannot make a difference. Although, one city and/or one county can make a difference which they did by rejecting Heiman's consolidation plan which she worked over 2 + years on.
My favorite moment came at the debate that took place at the C.K Newsome Center where Heiman tried to take over while Rick Davis was speaking for CORE. Instantly, Davis reminded her who was right and who had the floor. THANK YOU RICK!
- The Southwestern Indiana Chamber of Commerce (makes the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim look like a short name) was dealt a major defeat. While other chambers have designed and crafted good public policies such as Louisville's "Earn & Learn" and Oklahoma City's "MAPS" programs, our local chamber has been wasting their time on projects that benefit politicians and not city residents.
It was bad enough that the chamber would support David Dunn and the ECVB's ball field's plan, but it's even worse for them to support an interstate that is 84 miles LONGER than existing interstates (and is getting close to $5 billion when the Ohio River bridge is factored in)...
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To make matters worse, the chamber was the main organization spearheading the consolidation referendum, and you can take it to the bank that that is why many of our city politicians gave an effort on this referendum to begin with.
To get their plan passed, the chamber did everything. They threw thousands of dollars, many politicians and all of their political capital at this plan. But at the end of the day, THEY DIDN'T EVEN COME CLOSE! I sure hope this referendum was a wake-up call to the chamber to start changing their policy views but let's be honest, they won't be changing any time soon.
- Lloyd Winnecke and Carol McClintock were the main political leaders for consolidation. In fact, "Friends of Lloyd Winnecke" gave $10,000 to the cause. When I went down to the Fall Festival this year, I witnessed McClintock herself going up to as many people as she could find to pass out YES! literature to. Winnecke and McClintock did everything they could to get this passed. Thankfully, it was city and county voters who were in charge this time and they sent them a solid NO! message.
My opinion as to why Winnecke lost this battle boils down to the following reasons...
- There was no report for a page 13 to come into play
- There was no Parks Board to make the final approval
- There was no task force that was loaded down with Winnecke supporters who knew nothing about arenas (or consolidation for that matter)
- There was no way around the will of the voters and the people of the city and county like there was with Roberts Stadium.
- There was no judge whose wife was a Winnecke campaign supporter
When you take away the above 5 advantages Winnecke had in the Roberts Stadium battle, he basically has no hope of getting any of his plans or ideas passed. Lloyd Winnecke's plan to demolish Roberts Stadium was never popular at any of the task force sessions or with hardly any of the neighbors around Roberts Stadium or in the Evansville area for that matter. I would give anything for Indiana to be a referendum state so that what happened to Roberts Stadium could not happen again.
So, while last Tuesday's results may have not been everything we had hoped for, there was indeed one ray of sunshine for Roberts Stadium. The defeat of the YES! campaign was a small amount of justice for Roberts Stadium, although it certainly wasn't enough to save the facility.
Moving forward, it's going to be very hard knowing that we will not be able to save Roberts Stadium. So in the meantime, let's take our minds off of demolition for just a brief moment to celebrate the Yes! Campaign getting owned by Evansville and Vanderburgh County residents!
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